Читать книгу The Divine Lady - Elizabeth Louisa Moresby - Страница 5

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Greville did not return in February. He had other and more important invitations and time a little dulled the strong impression Emily Hart had made upon him. She had written more than once, dutiful ill-spelt letters, monuments of labour—love’s labour, and not wholly lost.

He had also seen her twice, for she insisted with Sir Harry on coming up to London to visit her mother, a simple, good-natured old body, now decorated with the remarkable name of Mrs. Cadogan (Heavens knows why!) and, through Greville’s own influence, serving as cook in the family of one of the numerous Hamilton and Greville connections. He had not wholly approved of the step of coming to London. Her enthusiasm and energy, far from warming his tepid blood, rather alarmed him than otherwise. He declined to see her but in Mrs. Cadogan’s presence and, though condescending and encouraging on the moral-immoral lines, was guarded. That anxiety for her mother’s company might mislead Sir Harry but could not himself. Months passed after the last visit with a letter or two, and then a silence. It certainly did not flatter him to believe he might be forgotten and that she was adjusting herself so comfortably to Sir Harry that outside interests were fading. Yet it might be so. The brief letters certainly showed no sign of study or improvement—she must therefore value his exhortations more lightly. That irked him somehow. It touched both curiosity and vanity, and breaking his almost invariable rule he wrote her a few friendly lines—no more.

He sat one morning in his London house in his embroidered Turkish dressing-gown, arranging a small cabinet of gems and intaglios belonging to his uncle, Sir William Hamilton, for which he had made himself responsible on their arrival in London. His letter acknowledging them lay on the table beside him.

“My dear Hamilton,” it began, for so he always called this almost brother-uncle, “I never saw anything more beautiful than this Medusa on agate. Your usual good fortune always attends you—” and so forth. His whole mind was on this as he moved and replaced the beautiful fossils of antique art with delicate fingers. He wished, indeed, at least a part of them were his own, for a schedule of expenses had given him some discomfort the night before, and it was clearly a choice between cutting down certain luxuries and selling one or two treasures to make both ends meet. A younger son of a great family is often face to face with these little difficulties. It is hard to be the same flesh and blood as the elder brother and see all the money, land, and nearly all the consideration flow in that channel, leaving the younger dry.

“A rich wife? True—but then—”

The gems occupied him now. He was bending over the cabinet in deep attention when his man brought in a post letter, ill-scrawled and sealed, with drops of wax about it as if the sender had suffered from extreme haste and agitation.

It fell into that calm, retired atmosphere of extreme culture and quiet like a meteor from another and more volcanic world of upheavals, but it did not hurry Charles Greville though he knew the hand. He still continued his delicate work until all were neatly sorted, the cabinet locked and the key in his pocket. And not till then did he slit the paper with a silver knife, and spread the big sheet open before him. The postmark was Chester, which somewhat surprised him.

Good Lord!—that brutal beast Sir Harry! He was turning her loose on the world, an expectant mother and without a guinea—a girl of seventeen! Yet even before he read the rest his prudence had suggested the thought that as likely as not she had brought it on herself by some unpardonable levity. Caution—caution! That was the basis of all his thoughts as he read. It went on like the cry of a tortured, unreasoning animal, a hare caught in a gin awaiting its murderer. That would not have moved him, but this stirred him somewhat.

“Yesterday did I receve your kind letter. It put me in some spirits for believe me I am allmost distrackdid. I have never hard from Sir H and he is not at Lechster now, I am sure. I have wrote 7 letters and no anser. What shall I dow? Good God, what shall I dow? I can’t come to town for want of mony. I have not a farthing to bless myself with and I think my friends looks cooly on me. I think so. O. G. what shall I dow? Oh how your letter affected me when you wished me happiness. O. G. that I was in your possession or in Sir H’s what a happy girl would I have been! Girl indeed! What else am I but a girl in distres—in reall distres. For God’s sak, G. write the minet you get this, and only tell me what I am to dow. Direct same whay. I am allmos mad. Oh for God’s sake tell me what is to become on me. O dear Greville write to me. Write to me. G. adieu and believe yours for ever, Emily Hart. Don’t tell my mother what distres I am in, and do afford me some comfort.”

A strange letter for a man of his age to be faced with since it did not concern him personally. He sat staring at it with distaste, seasoned with pity. Girls must expect to suffer who have no safeguards in a world made for and by men, but after all she was very young, and Sir Harry, with his abounding plenty, a brute. He sat long, for there was much to consider—even more for himself than for her. He drew up two mental columns for and against what she was obviously praying for. He liked the girl after a fashion; her docility pleased him; her passionate and submissive adoration of his own greatness won him; her beauty stirred him more than any he had ever beheld. Here he paused for a swift review of the past and deciding that so it certainly was, passed on to the next consideration. Now if he were to take a little home for her in the suburbs and make it his headquarters he might well sell or let this great mansion in Portman Square and thus pass the time in modest retrenchment until he could find the exactly suitable heiress who must ultimately become the Honourable Mrs. Charles Greville and provide him with unlimited means for the purchase of articles of virtu. This economy might be a most valuable matter to him at the present moment. And lastly, there was pity. Greville’s heart was not as mineralogical as his collections. It must be a petrifaction through and through if he were not stirred to compassion by this hopeless plight of despairing youth. It was not that. He remembered the great impassioned eyes, dewy with tears, looking into his own in the evergreen copse. He remembered the long embrace. He remembered her almost frantic joy when she stepped from the coach in London from those visits to her mother, the so-called Mrs. Cadogan, and found him waiting for her with his superfine air of a great gentleman who dropped these favours as trifles from chilly altitudes. How lovely she had been, all sparkling, smiling, trembling, gay as a daffodil tossing on a spring breeze. And he remembered, for in this gentleman prudence was his foremost virtue, that the fact of Mrs. Cadogan’s presence in London would relieve him from much responsibility should he decide to be gracious, and furthermore that he had heard she was an unsurpassable cook. She would naturally follow her daughter’s fortunes if needful and be a faithful steward of her interests.

Yet on the other side must be set the uncertainties of such a connection. Naturally it would not reflect on his own character, but he knew Emily’s temper uncertain, and her conduct to himself while in Sir Harry’s possession certainly suggested possible levities which he would not for one moment endure. Yet again, why should he? A very modest provision would always free him, especially with Mrs. Cadogan in the background.

And though he had no money to fling about idly he had quite sufficient for discreetly conducted pleasures. Above all, he hoped and expected everything from Emily’s obedience and the amazed gratitude which any condescension now would rivet to him unmovably. He could imagine her saving every expense, waiting in tender submission on his every look, lovely, worshipping—a sweeter Eve enclosed in a Paradise no other man should enter. Would he expose her to the attentions of a set of roisterers like Sir Harry’s companions? Never!

But the final thought that clinched his resolves was that never man could own a more wonderful pupil. The more he reviewed and dissected, the more certain he became that here was an uncut jewel of many carats and facets. To cut, to polish, to make her a lady, a woman of demirep fashion, a brilliant Aspasia, singing, posing, acting, the desired of all desires—this would be fame and envy in his world, and contempt for the boor who had tossed her away like a common pebble.

At last he saw his path. He drew the paper to him, read it once more and set himself to the answer. In short, he had decided he could rule her.

“My dear Emily, I do not make apologies for Sir H.’s behaviour to you, and altho’ I advised you to deserve his esteem by your good conduct, I own I never expected better from him. It was your duty to deserve good treatment from him, and it gave me great concern to see you imprudent the first time you came from the country, as the same conduct was repeated when you was last in town, I began to despair of your happiness. To prove to you that I do not accuse you falsely I only mention five guineas and half a guinea for coach. But, my dear Emily, as you seem quite miserable now I do not mean to give you uneasiness but comfort, and tell you I will forget your bad conduct to Sir H. and myself, and will not repent my good humour if I find you have learned by experience to value yourself and preserve your friends by good conduct and affection.

I will now answer your letter.

You tell me your friends look coolly on you; it is therefore time to leave them; but it is necessary for you to decide some points before you come to town. You are sensible that for the next three months your situation will not admit a giddy life if you wished it. After you have told me Sir H. neither provides for you nor takes any notice of your letters, it might appear laughing at you to advise you to make Sir H. more kind and attentive. I do not think a great deal of time should be lost, for I have never seen a woman clever enough to keep a man who is tired of her. But it is a great deal more for me to advise you never to see him again and write only to inform him of your determination. You must, however, do either the one or the other. You may easily see, my dear Emily, why it is absolutely necessary for this point to be settled before I can move one step. If you love Sir H. you should not give him up.

But besides this, my Emily, I would not be troubled with your connections (excepting your mother) and with Sir H.’s friends for the universe. My advice is then to take a steady resolution.

I shall then be free to dry up the tears of my lovely Emily and give her comfort. If you do not forfeit my esteem perhaps my Emily may be happy. You know I have been so by avoiding the vexation which frequently arises from ingratitude and caprice.

Nothing but your letter and your distress could incline me to alter my system, but remember I never will give up my peace or continue my connection one moment after my confidence is betrayed. If you should come to town and take my advice you should take another name. By degrees I would get you a new set of acquaintances, and by keeping your own secret I may expect to see you respected and admired. Thus far as relates to yourself. As to the child, its mother shall obtain its kindness from me and it shall never want. I enclose you some money: do not throw it away. God bless you, my dearest lovely girl, take your determination and let me hear from you once more. Adieu, my dear Emily.”

He read this epistle through twice (with certain passages omitted here), then folded and sealed it with his usual impeccable care. He knew it must shine like a rainbow in blackest clouds through the rain-wet eyes that would read it.

“I have three safeguards,” he reflected, as he impressed it with his seal of a flying Eros in cornelian, “money—she has none, nor prospects. The child, for who else will spend a doit on it? And gratitude—unless the old lady, her mother, urges her on to make a better market of such beauty.”

It will be observed that Greville put gratitude last. He prided himself on his knowledge of the human and especially the feminine heart. So he finally despatched his letter.

Next day he wrote to his dear Hamilton, between whom and himself ran a pleasant link of exchanged piccadilloes as well as of articles of virtu. He was wont to dissect the immoral in his reflections to Hamilton as well as in his own heart, and he did it now, dwelling slightly on the arrangement he contemplated and fully on his reasons for making it. He did not spare his Emily’s past. An immaculate one would have appeared as absurd in Sir William’s eyes as his own in such circumstances, and there was no thought of concealment. But it afforded an opening for the reflections on women which he privately judged worthy to be classed with the epigrams of the mighty, and, indeed, they were pretty well for a man of thirty odd. Thus he wrote of the weaker vessel.

“With women I observe they have only resource in art, and there is to them no interval between plain ground and the precipice, and the springs of action are so much in the extreme of the sublime and the low that no absolute dependence can be given by men—” and so forth—Rochefoucauld and water, but very impressive to Sir William Hamilton, who, though the elder, was deeply influenced by his handsome nephew’s worldly skill and finesse. Greville, at all events, did justice to Emily’s beauty, or as he now insisted on calling her, “Emma’s,” that name being in vogue as a romantic variant, and as such gladly adopted in the change he suggested.

“Emma,” he wrote, “is the most amazing beauty that ever my eyes lit on. I long, my dear Hamilton, for your opinion to support mine that on the whole she is quite unequalled in either of our memories. Contemplating her from the point of view of a student of the perfect standard of the antique I know no alteration I could have recommended either in face or figure unless it were possibly a little more delicacy of the hands and feet. Her masses of hair spring from a brow as low and broad as the Clytie’s, the length and roundness of her throat suggest our Roman Venus, the moulding of back and bosom the Stooping Venus, and—”

But why continue? All that he and Sir William had ever passed in delighted review in Italy was summoned to draw the fairest picture in the elder man’s mind that words could frame or memory paint. “And even this falls short of the reality,” ended the letter. “Could you imagine a man being such a ruffianly fool as to fling away such a jewel—the perfectest modern-antique that ever human eye beheld? I hope to make her a really economic housekeeper, for you know my needs are urgent and the house in Portman Square a terrible drain on my resources. I shall now proceed to let it.”

Sir William in reply expressed himself as passionately desirous to see the Renaissance beauty, as he termed her. “Your Emma reads like one of the sumptuous Venetian beauties whose calm and noble lines recall the antique dignity of the great Roman families. May it not be long ere I feast my eyes upon your choice.”

Greville could not acquiesce in the epithet, “calm.” He had met Emma at the office of the Cheshire coach a few days before and had much ado to prevent her flinging her arms about him in public in her glowing delight and enthusiasm. He warded this off, however, until they were in the hackney coach, and there, do what he would, she fell upon his shoulder sobbing and laughing in a breath.

“I knew—I knew at Up Park that something was to come of it. Oh, Greville, I knew you could not be so kind to me for nothing. Sure I was made to serve and love you, and is it really, really true I am to be with you and keep your house? Oh, indeed, you shall never have to complain of me. Every word I speak shall be considered, every action—”

He tried in vain to stem the outflow and finding that impossible submitted with patience for the length of a street and then turned the subject to her journey. Had he sent her an ample supply of money? She felt in her pocket beneath her long cloak and displayed a little, shabby purse with a half guinea and some loose shillings.

“Did I calculate so near as that? I would have sent you more had I known.” He spoke with compunction, looking at the remainder.

“Oh, Greville, you sent nobly; but there was a poor old woman in the coach, going to see her sick son at Greenwich, and a sailor too, and I couldn’t see her want for a meal and a drop of something warm to comfort her poor old heart, and I gave her—”

Greville’s cold eye arrested her. She looked up almost trembling.

“You gave her my money!”—with an awful pause between each word. “A guinea? Emma, you are hopeless. Indeed, I have no hopes of you. A heedless, wasteful girl! When will you consider?”

A pause, her head hanging down like a flower in the rain. Not a word to say for herself.

He relented presently and she revived as quickly as a dog beaten and then received into favour. Eagerly she promised amendment.

“I must give, Greville. I can’t say no somehow, but I promise and declare to you it shall never be more than a halfpenny at one time. Will you allow that? Just one halfpenny.”

Even Greville was wrung into a smile. No, he would not mind that. It was agreed.

He left her with Mrs. Cadogan, beheld the meeting—a little awed by his stately presence—viewed with condescension the two rooms chosen at his expense, and then departed. He did not intend to see either again until the house at Edgware Row, Paddington Green should be ready for occupation, and its new mistress ready to take up her duties.

Her situation repelled his fastidiousness, though she carried it with the physical indifference and health of the peasant to whom such matters are a trifle in nature’s way, and her cloak was womanly draped about her.

By a coincidence he met Sir Harry Fetherstonehaugh two nights later at Almack’s and was obliged to submit to a greeting he would have avoided if he could.

“Why, how was it you never came down this winter? I don’t know as I ever saw the birds stronger on the wing. I had the old set down and plenty good sport.”

“And hunting?” asked Greville.

“Good, take it for all. No long hard frosts. Oh!—you heard the little girl I had down there has left me, did you? Emily Hart.”

“I think I did, now you mention it.” Greville was idly looking at the dancers in the room beyond. Sir Harry could not flatter himself he was interesting his audience.

“Yes, and if you hear it spread about I was harsh with her, I beg you’d contradict it. I hear as how Weldon should say he’d have given her a home had he known the facts. Well, sir, the facts were these: That girl, she’d kick up the very devil’s own dust if you crossed her in anything, and I ask your reason, is a man to expect this from a mere slut? And then, she didn’t know how to behave to the men I brought down. Either held herself away and wouldn’t look at ’em if they didn’t please her, or was too friendly if they did. Mind, I don’t mean to accuse her of more than a hail fellow well met, but who, I ask you, was madam to indulge herself in her whims when all she was to think of was how to please me?”

Greville responded in an indistinct murmur. He was undoubtedly relieved to find the indictment no heavier. It might have been one to give a blow to his dreams of quiet settlement.

“So I just upped and said we must part, and, had she shown a spark of good nature, even then might have relented—”

“Excuse me, I see a man I must speak with—urgent business. Return soon!” Greville shot out, and so away with him and left the baronet staring. The more so as he joined no man, but an extremely dignified and beautiful lady of middle age, the famous Duchess of Argyll, formerly Duchess of Hamilton and cousin of Greville’s uncle, Sir William Hamilton. Stars of such magnitude scarcely shone in Sir Harry’s personal heaven, and he looked on a little sourly while Greville, perfectly at his ease, squired the great lady into the dancing room, laughing and talking.

“I wonder now did I make any mess of what I was saying about that little spitfire!” he thought to himself. “I wouldn’t lose Greville’s good word, so I wouldn’t. But I’m glad to be rid of her for all! A man wants a new face about him and must be master and more.”

As I dismiss Sir Harry here, his future fate may be given. A pretty and virtuous girl, the daughter of one of his village labourers, caught his roving fancy next and would have none of his secret approaches. It is possible that Mrs. Hart’s adventures, well known in the village, served as a beacon in dangerous seas. She rebuffed him quietly but firmly, and the more he floundered, the deeper the hook pierced his gills. He was a man who could not endure defeat, but must have the victory however ruinous the cost. His friends watched the struggle with an interest chiefly expressed in heavy wagers, yet even this circumstance, though perfectly well known to him, could not save him from a much happier fate than he deserved. For the girl married him and made him an excellent wife and Lady Fetherstonehaugh, and a sensible, well-conducted mistress of his great house, in breeding and temper matching him far better than a lady of quality. A man who has erred less has often been less happily suited than this gentleman who did not get his deserts.

Greville, however, never used her ladyship as an example of instruction for his Emma, considering that this amazing circumstance might excite hopes of an order the very last he wished to enter her mind, and it was not till many years later she knew the fate of her ancient admirer. She could laugh at it then for reasons Greville could never in his wildest dreams have anticipated.

So events drew on. The “little Emma” was born and despatched to her mother’s distant village of Hawarden for tending, and that her neighbourhood might not inconvenience her young mother’s protector.

And thus Mrs. Hart became Greville’s housekeeper in Edgware Row, with Mrs. Cadogan’s invaluable aid in the background.